None So Blind
by beesandbrews
Summary: Jack Harkness loves Ianto Jones. The trouble is, he doesn't know what to do about it. A companion piece to Epiphany. Beta by Amand-r.


Jack was in love with Ianto Jones.

This was hardly a staggering revelation. Falling in love was one of Jack's gifts. He could be instantly smitten over a smile, a bad joke, or a good con. He possessed, if he did say so himself, a finely-tuned sense for appreciating what made an individual unique and thus, lovable. No, what was different, he realized as he looked down on Ianto's sleeping form, was the intensity of the feeling he held for the young man. Somewhere along the line, Ianto Jones had crept under his defenses and found his way into Jack's heart.

That was troubling. And Jack wasn't sure what he should do about it.

Jack didn't do love. Well, not love with a capital L, the type with commitments and responsibility. He'd tried, even before he became immortal, but it never ended well. He always found a way to screw it up. Or circumstances did. People who loved Jack Harkness had a tendency to end up dead or worse.

Often times, if they survived, they ended up hating him. After Jack got over his resentment, he usually ended up taking a good long look in the mirror and commiserating with them. Jack was, after all, good at seeing things from other people's perspectives. It was what made him such a skilled conman, the ability to empathize and then exploit those feelings for his own gain. Each time it happened he vowed, never again. And for a time, he would keep his promise. But love was a tricky thing, and it had a tendency to creep up on him when he least expected it.

No, he had endured hurting Ianto once and he had no desire to do so again. It didn't help that he had been right and Ianto had been wrong, and Jack's actions had been completely justified. He had to save the planet. Killing what was left of Lisa had been a righteous act.

Ianto had been understandably devastated. He had protected her with every resource at his disposal, including his body, using it as a tool to seduce Jack and ingratiate himself into his life. It had given him an excuse to learn Jack's routines. It had given him a reason to stay late. It had put Jack off his guard. Enough so, Jack had started to entertain the notion that maybe Ianto could be more than just a diversion against an endless string of long, lonely nights.

Which was why Jack had been so gutted by his betrayal.

He should have killed him then. It was policy. One bullet to the head. One closed file. Jones, I. Administrative Support Officer: Deceased. But Jack couldn't pull the trigger. And he couldn't make the others carry out an order he was unprepared to carry out himself.

So Ianto lived. And Jack's heart hardened a little bit more.

Or so he'd thought at the time. But he'd been wrong. That nascent stirring he felt had survived the anger, and the pain, and the guilt that he should have handled things differently. He should have pushed away the animal fear that had twisted his guts when he had seen a cyberman in the Hub. He should have found a way to fix Lisa. Subdued her. Frozen her. Something.

When Ianto vowed vengeance, Jack had taken him at his word. He'd invoked appropriate measures. Precautions that in retrospect, should already have been in place: bugging Ianto's flat and his computer, putting a tracer on his car. Monitoring equipment Jack had been negligent installing because they'd been busy and he probably wouldn't have spent much time reviewing the feeds anyway. Ianto had been vetted by Torchwood One, and he was a clerk, not a field agent. According to his file he was polite, punctual, and fastidious about his work. There was nothing in his record to suggest he had the ingenuity to get up to much in the way of trouble.

Ianto had survived Canary Wharf and had come back looking for more. Jack had seen that before in military units he'd served with, yet this time, he'd misinterpreted it completely. At first, he'd thought Ianto was one of those last men standing who couldn't hack the guilt. The ones that kept putting in for more dangerous assignments until someone finally put them down like wounded dogs. Technically, they were unfit for duty and their commanders knew it, but war times were expedient and more often than not, such soldiers were a useful commodity.

The hard fact was if they didn't die on the battlefield, they'd only make a nuisance of themselves among the civilian population. And the result was generally the same, only considerably messier. Two of Ianto's colleagues had gone that way, taking their families and a police constable along as collateral damage. One more had been sectioned indefinitely.

Jack had thought maybe he could do better. He had figured he could make Ianto feel useful and let him work out his demons in the confines of the Hub. Little had he known that had been part of the plan all along. Butler. Handyman. Clerk. All the odd jobs the others didn't have time or desire to do, Ianto had taken up with just the correct degree of enthusiasm. He had never asked for field time. He went, when he was directed, but he never asked. Death by Torchwood may have been Jack's assumption, but it had never been Ianto's intention.

So, it hadn't quite worked out the way Jack had hoped. Things had gotten awkward as the others got used to having a well-intentioned traitor in their midst. The uncomfortable feelings in Jack's heart had quieted for a time as he'd nursed his hurt and disappointment and wondered how Ianto would take his revenge. Jack found he had new reasons to keep his eye on Ianto besides the cut of his suits. He wasn't worried for himself, but he had to protect his team.

Ianto had surprised him. Again. Jack hadn't expected to be forgiven. Especially after the cannibals. But Ianto had forgiven him. Jack hadn't expected to work his way back into Ianto's bed either, but mutual need had outweighed emotion. And Torchwood operatives were, as a rule, skilled in compartmentalizing their feelings.

The experience had been instructive. Ianto was as gifted a conman as Jack himself. He could be just as ruthless and just as opportunistic. He was single-minded and quietly capable. He'd make a formidable enemy, just as he could be a formidable friend: loyal to a fault and fiercely protective.

Jack wasn't sure which he found more intimidating.

Ianto stirred in his sleep, rolling over to bury his face in the pillow. In the dim light of the bunker, Jack watched him shift restlessly in the confines of the camp bed. He looked so innocent. Jack smiled bitterly. Even in sleep, Ianto was deceptive. There was nothing innocent about him. It had all been stripped away by a hard upbringing and a harder life. One more reason why Jack should send him away.

If Jack were strong enough, he would take Ianto someplace nice, buy him a meal, and then break off their affair permanently. He would force him back into the world, just as he continued to push Gwen. Towards a life where some good person would take him by the hand and lead him to a place filled with simple pleasures and not bloody death.

The problem was, Jack wasn't strong enough. He needed Ianto. He needed his quiet efficiency. He needed the way he stood at Jack's shoulder, unobtrusively lending his support. He needed the shy smile he received each morning with his first cup of coffee and the saucy come hither grin that only appeared when they were alone and frantic to get out of their clothes as quickly as possible. He needed the way Ianto organized his day and made a dozen headaches disappear before lunchtime. And he needed the way Ianto instinctively knew when he'd be content to cram down a hurried sandwich, or when a secluded table at the back of the pub serving all day breakfast better suited his mood.

It was an arrangement and it worked. So why did Jack want to screw it up with emotions like love?

There was no way Ianto could love him. Not after everything that had passed between them. If occasionally he was kind. If he stepped out of his role as butler, or secretary, or general dogsbody, and became momentarily Ianto Jones, friend, who took Jack into his arms and let him silently break down because everything became too much, it was only because Jack had done the same for him, and Ianto disliked debts. It certainly wasn't because Ianto cared. At least not like that. And if, after one of their quieter interludes, Ianto had looked at him with something approaching tenderness, it was only because the moment demanded it, and not because he felt anything deeper. How could he?

Jack carefully extricated himself from the bed and silently pulled on his clothes. He knelt at Ianto's side and almost, but not quite, brushed his fingertips against a bare shoulder as he came to a decision.

He couldn't quell the stirring in his heart, but he could do right by Ianto. He'd never tell him how he felt. He wouldn't push him away, but he wouldn't encourage him either. And if someday, Ianto came to him and said he was through, Jack would smile and wish him happiness and never let on that his heart had been torn in half.

Because he loved him, he would do that much for Ianto Jones.


End file.
